iv INTRODUCTORY PREFACE. 



and birds, executed without artistic sense and in entire ignorance of the structure of the animals. The 

 pictures in this work are faultless, all of them having been reproduced from living subjects and showing 

 the hand of the master in every line. No such extended and comprehensive system of illustration of 

 animals was ever before undertaken and this feature of the work alone must make it invaluable to 

 every one who seeks acquaintance with those creatures, which, while they cannot speak, are so closely 

 connected with the life of Man, contributing in some part at least to his support, his enjoyment and 

 his amusement. 



Interest in natural history is extending, as Man's scope of vision enlarges and he grasps more 

 firmly the thought that the lower animals enter so closely into his own life and form so important a 

 part in the great economy of nature. The great Scheitlin, as quoted by Brehm, has truly said, " The 

 brute's fate is like ours. It is oftentimes made to share Man's fate, or Man shares its fate ; it perishes 

 with him in fire and water and battle. It is a pity that Man forgets that the higher animals, at least, 

 know the difference between treatment that is good and treatment that is bad." Man is greatly in 

 debt to the humbler creatures, which supply them with their flesh for food, their hide, their hair and 

 their horns. It has been truthfully claimed that Man could not live in comfort if deprived of the serv- 

 ice rendered by animals in life or death. They supply meat, milk, fat, perfumery, drugs, fur, wool, 

 feathers, ivory, bone and a thousand other useful and ornamental commodities. They are companions, 

 as the Dog, the Monkey and certain birds ; beasts of burden, as the Horse, Ass, Ox, Camel, Llama, 

 and afford endless sport and diversion for hunters, who, unfortunately, are too frequently cruel and 

 make unnecessary slaughter of the defense-less. The student finds in the successive steps of animal 

 life order and arrangement and takes delight in classifying the creatures according to their station, ob- 

 serving the points of difference, and determining the uses and adaptations of the individuals to their 

 environment. 



Extending the thought of imparting facts to the youthful mind, it might be shown that seven ver- 

 tebrae usually form the neck of the vertebrate animals, whether it be the Giraffe or the Mole ; but that 

 in the tail they vary from four to forty-six. It might also be shown that the muscles of animals se*- 

 the bones in motion, and that these muscles form meat, which in certain animals is the food of Man 

 It is interesting to note that Man alone of all the mammals walks erect ; that the flight of swift birds 

 is far more rapid than that of the most fleet mammal ; and that the Bat cannot really fly because birds 

 alone can do this, but that they flutter in the air. Men who have not been taught to swim, the Man- 

 like Apes and the Baboons, are the only- mammals which are unable to sustain themselves in water ; 

 while the Whale and the Sea-Lion, the Dugong and the Manatee, spend their entire lives in the sea. 

 Take the eye of the animal, which is the most expressive part of its face, and there can be seen in it 

 in many cases the character of its individual possessor, as the wicked eye of the Snake, the piercing 

 eye of the Eagle ; this being especially true among mammals, as the dull eye of the Cow, the mild 

 one of the Gazelle, the stupid ones of a Sheep, the false ones of a Wolf, etc. 



Characteristics, traits, etc., are thus observable in all the creatures, from the highest to the lowest, 

 and may be pointed out, emphasized and indelibly impressed upon the mind of the young, especially 

 by aid of the incomparable pictures contained in this work. The advanced reader and student will 

 discover a complete and perfect system, extending from the highest Ape to the lowest creature, each 

 in its place and every one well defined and accurately described. 



It will be seen that the creatures are distributed all over the world and that America contains a 

 larger variety and more interesting types, especially of higher animals, than the other portions of the 

 globe. In the northern part are the Bison, the Prairie Dog and the Opossum, while in the southern 

 portion are prehensile-tailed Monkeys, Vampires, Peccaries, Llamas, Alpacas and various Edentata, that 

 are peculiar to these localities. In the representation of the various belts of earth the division made by 

 Wallace is followed in this work. It will be seen that, as a rule, the color of an animal corresponds 

 closely with its surroundings ; that the majority of mammals live in flocks, each having a leader, that 

 may be male or female; that when awake most animals are employed in search for food; that Birds 

 eat more than mammals and that the former are much more active than the latter. 



The comprehensiveness and interest of the work must be discovered in a perusal of its pages, as 

 only brief and disconnected references have here been made as to its scope and general value. It 

 covers a field not hitherto occupied in this country, embracing as it does the most thorough informa- 

 tion with most graphic narrative, the whole embellished by artistic illustrations which so faithfully por- 

 tray the lineaments of the animals as almost to make unnecessary the work of verbal description. Such 

 a work as this, within the mental grasp of all, must enter the home and the school and result in a 

 wide dissemination of additional knowledge concerning the beasts of the field, the birds of the air 

 and all manner of creeping things. . 



